Translated By Tony Qin
“Dharma Realm Dependent Origination” is a fundamental teaching of the Huayan School, articulating a profound vision of the universe and all phenomena “co-arising in infinite interdependence.” This teaching encompasses two distinctive insights—totality and perfect interpenetration—revealing both deep philosophical understanding and realized experience.
1. The Vision of Totality
The Huayan vision of the Dharma Realm “arising from its nature” reveals that all phenomena exist “simultaneously and fully in interconnectedness.” The universe is a boundless system in which all phenomena serve as one another’s causes and conditions, co-arising in infinitely layered mutual dependence and perfect completeness.
Within this grand totality—regardless of distinctions such as emptiness and existence, general and specific, large and small, one and many, hidden and manifest, principal and subordinate—all are mutually inclusive and interpenetrating, forming a unified totality in perfect harmony without obstruction.
While the myriad phenomena of the universe differ in form and appearance, they are in truth an indivisible whole, with no boundaries between objects.
2. The Vision of Perfect Interpenetration
According to the Great Dependent Origination Dhāraṇī, all phenomena in the cosmos arise through the convergence of countless conditions. Every phenomenon “exists through conditions”; therefore, none exists apart from any other. All are mutually inclusive and interpenetrating, free and without obstruction. Thus, the universe exists in perfect harmony, without obstruction among all phenomena.
According to the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, when Vairocana Buddha entered the “Ocean-Seal Samādhi,” he beheld the cosmic totality of the Dharma Realm as a single, perfectly unified whole in which all things interpenetrate without boundaries. The key to realizing this vision of “Dharma Realm Dependent Origination” lies in understanding the principle of “mutual identity and interpenetration” (相即相入). In other words, the non-obstruction among all phenomena is the resulting realization, while the insight of mutual identity and interpenetration is what makes this realization possible.
“Mutual identity and interpenetration” describe two levels of contemplation. “Mutual identity” concerns the level of fundamental reality and addresses the duality between emptiness and existence in worldly understanding. “Mutual interpenetration” concerns the level of manifest function and addresses the duality between influence and passivity in worldly understanding.
Mutual Identity
The term “identity” means “not other” and “not separate.” Thus, mutual identity reveals that all phenomena are inseparable in their fundamental oneness. In the worldly perspective of emptiness versus existence, the negation of one side creates the very condition for the affirmation of the other. The principle of mutual identity asserts that this relationship itself forms the condition for their oneness.
As Master Fazang (643–712) explains in The Treatise on the Classification of the Huayan One Vehicle Teaching:
“When one is, the other must not be; thus, one exists through the other. Why is this so? Because one’s affirmation is conditioned upon the other’s negation. Conversely, when one is empty, [the reverse also holds true]”
In other words, what is affirmed inherently contains what is negated, and vice versa. The entire universe is established upon this relationship of mutual identity.
All conditioned phenomena, in their fundamental nature, are “empty,” yet in their manifested aspect, they are “existent.” Emptiness and existence are not different or separate, but mutually identical in their fundamental oneness. This mutual identity can be likened to waves and water: the waves represent phenomena—the realm of appearance or existence—while the water represents their fundamental nature, emptiness. The two are inseparable: the wave is none other than water, and water is none other than the wave.
Although the myriad phenomena differ in form and appearance, all are manifestations of the same True Suchness Nature. Thus, “one is all, and all is one,” in perfect harmony without obstruction. This is what is called “Dharma Realm Dependent Origination.”
Mutual Interpenetration
The term “interpenetration” refers to the reciprocal influence and interaction among phenomena. “Mutual interpenetration” means mutual inclusion and accommodation—a relationship of interdependent coexistence.
How, then, do all things coexist? In the same treatise, Master Fazang writes:
“When one is influential, it can encompass the other. The other, being passive, is included within it. When the one is passive and the other is influential, the reverse also holds true. Outside the perspective of fundamental reality, phenomena no longer appear mutually identical; the thorough interaction of their influences and functions becomes mutual interpenetration.”
This means that the causes and conditions in dependent origination each possess varying degrees of influence and function—some are influential, others are passive. Those that are influential play a leading role, while those that are passive play a subservient role, taking the influence of the influential as their own. This is called “interpenetration.” Thus, all causes and conditions act upon one another and mutually enter and contain each other.
It is like two mirrors facing one another, each reflecting and containing the image of the other. The larger mirror can encompass the smaller, yet the smaller can also encompass the larger. Thus it is said, “A speck of dust can contain Mount Sumeru; a drop of water can hold the vast ocean.” This unhindered and all-encompassing interpenetration is what is called “Dharma Realm Dependent Origination.”
The Avataṃsaka Sūtra—the “King of Sutras”—depicts the wondrous and liberated state realized by Vairocana Buddha. In this realization, the Buddha can “enter infinite kalpas within a single instant” and “encompass a single instant within infinite kalpas.” The Buddha is capable of such profound realization because all dharmas are without self-nature. Having eradicated attachment to both self and dharmas, the Buddha attained perfect freedom and the flawless spiritual power of complete liberation, transcending all boundaries of time and space, beholding all phenomena in mutual identity and interpenetration in perfect and unobstructed harmony—a state truly inconceivable.
